


I Brake For Bunny

by Paxella



Category: WKRP in Cincinnati
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-09
Updated: 2017-01-09
Packaged: 2018-09-16 01:57:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 694
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9268634
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Paxella/pseuds/Paxella
Summary: A one-shot about Bunny Tarlek and her parents, Herb and Lucille.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Just a little one-shot I wrote about the Tarleks back in 2005. I always intended to write long fic for WKRP, and I probably still will.

Bunny Tarlek was a dainty thing, her hair pulled about in pigtails with glasses nearly too big for her face; her mommy had told her once that the glasses would probably be permanent, but that if her daddy ever got up the money for her braces and her glasses chanced to break, she might just have to squint for awhile. As for Bunny, she didn't mind the glasses, and she wouldn't mind the braces...she was a cheerful child in many ways, and seldom let the world - or her correctional machinery - bother her.

The start of school had almost ruined this for her, as she came into constant teasing. Emmy and Roger were the worst. Roger was a general name-caller: four-eyes, donkey-lips, that sort of thing. As for Emmy, a year older than Bunny and a might bit bigger, she had declared one day that her father worked for Cincinnati's number-one radio station, WPIG, and that _her_ father said that _Bunny's_ father was an imbecile, and that he'd killed all kinds of turkeys and ducks and was apt to kill again.

Bunny had fought the accusations, knowing that they were true. Mommy, of course, hardly ever let Daddy down about those "poor defenseless ducks," and as for the turkeys, all the local and a few national television stations had covered the atrocity - her daddy took up channel-changing at a rapid pace. Upon her questioning this he explained to her, "If I want to look like an idiot in my own house I can do a good enough job of it myself."

But still, she fought. After a week of school she came home and declared proudly to Mommy, "I hit a PIG today!" and her mother, confused a moment, murmured something about ducks, before realizing just what was going on, and she yelled, "Herb, get in here! Your daughter is beating up your competitors!"

Bunny had received the standard talk about backing away from a bully, which her daddy seemed to mumble through in a confused sort of manner upon urging from mommy, and he finished as thus: "And you just...you shouldn't hit people, Bunny, because they might hit you back or discredit your reputation. Do you understand?"

"Yes, Daddy." She kissed him, and ran outside to play, leaving her parents to remain motionless and pondersome for some time. Finally they spoke to one another:

"Herb, for heaven's sake, is that the way you give a speech?"

"Well, I...what was I supposed to say? My son already plays with dolls, and now my daughter is beating up kids at school!"

"That's entirely beside the point." She sat on the sofa beside her husband, adjusting his hair out of instinct. "Bunny is very sensitive, Herb."

"I know that."

"I worry sometimes about what you say to the children when I'm gone!" She sighed heavily, forgetting his hair. "I mean, if this is how you handle bullies, then what on earth did you say to her about the frog?"

Bunny entered the living room to a silent Mommy and Daddy. She had only been outside for a moment, but already she was covered in a musty, dirty shell. She smiled. "Herb the Third and me was playing. I won!" And she ran off.

For a moment all was still; and then Herb Tarlek stood slowly, his wife Lucille following his lead. And he said: "I'll...tend to Little Herb."

"And I'll explain to Bunny that you don't know anything about handling bullies."

Herb flinched at this, but within the moment, both parents were running, yelling their children's names, in a ritualistic fashion brought on by daily catastrophes. Bunny was found playing with Greenpeace II in her room, happy as a clam, and as for Herb the Third, he had been laying silently, carelessly in the dirt in the backyard until his father picked him up, handed him a doll which had landed several feet away, and brought him in for dinner.

As punishment, Bunny was not allowed dessert; she only ate that which Herb the Third couldn't finish, and Herb the Third hadn't been very hungry that night.

At least she'd learned her lesson.


End file.
